A speech intro applicable to many a policy address

Behold this fine introduction to a speech by Verizon EVP Tom Tauke at the New Democrat Network Keynote, Wed., in Washington, D.C., March 24:

In San Jose, in the heart of the high-tech world, sits what’s known as the Winchester Mystery House. It started out in the late 1880s as a small farmhouse and by the 1920s was transformed into a 160-room, seven-story Victorian mansion with doors and stairways that lead no where, dead-end hallways, and mazes that can leave you lost for hours. The house grew that way—with no logic or plan—because the owner just kept adding, adjusting and adding again as needs or desires required; the result is an architectural white elephant.

In the world of communications policy, we have our own version of the Mystery House.  It started as the Radio Act of 1927, was subsumed by the Communications Act of 1934, and after numerous amendments during the last three-quarters century, it’s become an interesting maze that the Federal Communications Commission and all of us attempt to navigate as we play various roles in the Internet ecosystem.